but I really felt like there had to be just one more.
Then I received a surprising text from eman during SPOP 8 Gold modern practice: “just curious…do you wanna do spop 8???” I couldn’t believe it. I kept the faith and God answered. I know it seems like I’m exaggerating my excitement or the magnitude of just one more hall, but considering the abundant highs and many lows, I knew I needed just one more to wrap things all up…gain some closure I suppose. And now, SPOP 8 would be that opportunity I had been waiting for.
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I immediately called Eman.
Eman: Okay, Jesse’s gonna be the cp because you’re replacing a first-year.
Me: Dude, I’ll take anything. Thank you eman, like seriously thank you so much!
-----------I excitedly texted Jesse to let him know that I would be joining him for spop 8.
He texted back: “Legit! Let’s freaking rock Cuesta!!”
I was driving down the structure when I received that text and went absolutely crazy, literally screaming to the point where I realized I should maybe pull over. CUESTA?! I thanked God, drove home to tell the roomies, literally ran to the apartment…then to my surprise, our dorm friends were also at our place… “GUESS WHAT HALL I’M STAFFING TOMORROW!” “CUESTA!!” The great news was followed by cheers and high fives all over. I couldn’t contain my excitement. God does work in mysterious ways.
Talk about going full circle…CUESTA?! Cuesta was my dorm-home away from home my first year AND the first hall I staffed Purple Year [mapCUESTA treasure chest-a!]. mapCUESTA was definitely a life-changing hall where I was blessed with the presence of amazing staffers [cp brad, hollie, chris chu, geo, priya, lynda and my baby sister jungle] AND our very special kids [oh man, milo, our star!]. That was where I had made lifelong friends during the year and then initiated my staffer status in the summer. It's also where I had arrived at the pivotal realization that sacrificing my entire summer without any type of compensation was more than worth it. [yes, it’s true…we don’t get paid, we don’t get credits, we don’t get volunteer hours…but the fulfillment from the spoppers’ gratitude and testimonies after spops is a major reward in itself…and I guess the free cha and commons doesn’t hurt either]
suite 101 ladies:
suite 103 fellas:
SPOP 8, comic conCUESTA FIESTA! I went into detail about TFO (the first one) so I suppose it would be appropriate to elaborate on TLO (the last one). From their arrival, I could feel it, the energy, the enthusiasm, the shared love of games! These kids were super down. We played the games, we teased their minds, we stayed up all night, shared ghost stories, we hugged, we laughed, we expressed gratitude. We WERE the fiesta! I couldn’t have asked for a better group of kids to top off my spop action with [so thanks all you party people…jesse, christang, vince, ladi, chiell ann, jeremy and the rest of you crazy cuesta heads!]
Although I’ve been assigned to a transfer success, I went through every moment of spop 8 with the clear understanding that "this was TLO baby so make it count". It has been quite a ride full of emotions-turned-exhaustion-turned-absolute contentment. I actually don’t know what to feel right now because I know the summer isn’t exactly over yet, there's a couple more opportunities to perform with gold modern, the friendships have just begun and the staffer-spopper splove will inevitably return in the fall when random kids throw up hall signs around campus. Every SPamazing moment of the summer, whether I was in my staffer gear among spoppers or just =kickin’ it= with staffers has reaffirmed my ultimate love for this program.
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